Archives for April 2013

Tomorrow we’re hosting the free Fostering Lifelong Learners: Prescribing Books for Early Childhood Education conference with Reach Out and Read and the Cambridge Public Library. Pediatricians, educators, critics, and librarians will speak about early learning and literacy from birth to preschool. Over the last few weeks Roger gave several of the presenters his “five questions” […]

The Dark by Lemony Snicket; illus. by Jon Klassen Preschool, Primary Little, Brown 40 pp. 4/13 978-0-316-18748-0 $16.99 Leave it to Lemony Snicket to craft a story personifying “the dark” — an idea all too real and frightening for children afraid of what lurks in the shadows. But they will find a kindred spirit in […]

When writing nonfiction, including dialogue can be a dangerous proposition. Several years ago, I asked an author about the snappy dialogue in his nonfiction picture book about a poet. He said the words were a combination of excerpts from the poet’s autobiography and some things the author “rather assumed.” The book, he continued, got “whacked […]

Between songs, Arlo Guthrie likes to strum his guitar and tell a story he learned from his father, Woody Guthrie. It goes like this: Two rabbits, a mama and a papa, are running full speed from a pack of baying hounds. Spotting a hollow log, the rabbits rush in and are immediately surrounded by the […]

We mourn the death (last Friday) of E.L. Konigsburg, who never wrote a book I didn’t want to read. (Not that I love them all, but even where she went wrong, she did so magnetically.) I remember a slightly uneasy conversation with Konigsburg’s editor Jean Karl right after Elaine had won her second Newbery Medal […]

Welcome to our third issue of Nonfiction Notes from the Horn Book, and I’m pleased to be able to tell you that Nonfiction Notes will now be published six times a year, thanks to your interest and advertisers’ enthusiasm. We hope that you find this newsletter useful in finding good nonfiction books for your library […]

Readers frequently ask where E. L. Konigsburg, my mother, gets her ideas. I’ll tell. Although Mom can detect the most subtle nuance in painting or prose, she never developed a musical ear. Knowing that, my brother Paul purchased several classical records and proceeded to give her a course in music appreciation. It is not surprising […]

Elaine Lobl Konigsburg was born in New York City but lived most of her precollege days in the small town of Farrell, Pennsylvania. Although she readily adapts to any environment, it is probable that the excitement of Manhattan will always appeal to her most. A keen observer, she delights in being bombarded by a multitude […]

You see before you today a grateful convert from chemistry. Grateful that I converted and grateful that you have labeled the change successful. The world of chemistry, too, is thankful; it is a neater and safer place since I left. This conversion was not so difficult as some others I have gone through. The transformation […]

We were very sad to hear about the recent passing of E. L. Konigsburg. Konigsburg was the author of Newbery Award–winners From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and The View from Saturday, along with Jennifer, Hecate, MacBeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth, which won a Newbery Honor the same year as Mixed-Up Files won […]